WYSE: Mechanical Enginnering Day 5
This morning, we continued work on our 3D Printers. We managed to use a special Motor Chip to get our Stepper Motor not only running left and right, but also changing speed, based on button inputs form a sepearte breadboard.
Today was also the day Code Gang and Build Gang got together to try and connect our motor code to the physical 3D lifter.
After that, I began testing what amount of rotations were required to move the 3D Printer 2/3 mm down and 1/3 mm up on a loop, which is what the 3D Printer required to work properly. I use the green tape (shown in next picture) to determine distance for 10 360 rotations, and found that for every 10 rotations it moves 7 mm, and applied that knowledge to the code.
We moved onto our next activity for the day, which was Making our own Carbon Ink Flames, taught by Assistant Professor Lili Cai. We set tissue and alcohol on fire, and through containing chemicals, we could prevent C from becoming CO2 in the air and collect carbon on a plate. Once it’s on the metal, it sticks and stays as carbon.
Here are our results from collecting carbon. We then were able to mix more 70% isopropyl alcohol to create a ink mixture.
After this activity, we learned about prosthetics from Professor Mariana Kersh.
In this activity, we used an air pump to prototype a bendable prosthetic arm.
After some building and deliberating, we fonud that simple designs are both eaiser to construct and easier to use. So, we constructed a 2 finger prosthetic arm (as our goal was to pick up items like a pair of sunglasses).
And here is our finished arm! It’s (definitely not a bootleg version of Psyonic, but a) original prototype named PsyOnIx.
The time came for judging our arms, to see how they work. Our counselors got together and sat at the front desk, playing it up like Shark Tank, to see which prosthetic was the best among our groups.
In the afternoon we attended an Ice Cream Social, and got the opportunity to speak with our counselors and other UIUC students on all questions pertaining to college; admissions, essays, finance, how college classes work and how to balance social life, student organizations and studying, as well as getting help from professors out of class. They especially said an important part of college is putting in effort, dedication and work outside of class.
WYSE Posts:
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